One Thousand White Women (Reprint) (Paperback) by Jim Fergus

About the Book

Based on an actual historical event, "One Thousand White Women" tells the story--in diary and letter form--of a young woman, who in 1875, travels to the American West to marry Little Wolf, the chief of the Cheyenne nation.

Book Synopsis

Based on an actual historical event but told through fictional diaries, this is the story of May Dodd--a remarkable woman who, in 1875, travels through the American West to marry the chief of the Cheyenne Nation.

One Thousand White Women begins with May Dodd's journey into an unknown world. Having been committed to an insane asylum by her blue-blood family for the crime of loving a man beneath her station, May finds that her only hope for freedom and redemption is to participate in a secret government program whereby women from "civilized" society become the brides of Cheyenne warriors. What follows is a series of breathtaking adventures--May's brief, passionate romance with the gallant young army captain John Bourke; her marriage to the great chief Little Wolf; and her conflict of being caught between loving two men and living two completely different lives.

"Fergus portrays the perceptions and emotions of women...with tremendous insight and sensitivity."--Booklist

"A superb tale of sorrow, suspense, exultation, and triumph." --Winston Groom, author of Forrest Gump

Review Quotes

"A most impressive novel that melds the physical world to the spiritual. One Thousand White Women is engaging, entertaining, well-written, and well-told. It will be widely read for a long time, as will the rest of Jim Fergus's work." --Rick Bass, author of Where the Sea Used to Be

"Jim Fergus knows his country in a way that's evocative Dee Brown and all the other great writers of the American West and its native peoples. But One Thousand White Women is more than a chronicle of the Old West. It's a superb tale of sorrow, suspense, exultation, and triumph that leaves the reader waiting to turn the page and wonderfully wrung out at the end." --Winston Groom, author of Forrest Gump

"The best writing transports readers to another time and place, so that when they reluctantly close the book, they are astonished to find themselves returned to their everyday lives. One Thousand White Women is such a book. Jim Fergus so skillfully envelops us in the heart and mind of his main character, May Dodd, that we weep when she mourns, we shake our fist at anyone who tries to sway her course, and our hearts pound when she is in danger." --Colorado Springs Gazette

"An impressive historical...terse, convincing, and affecting." --Kirkus Reviews

About The Author

Jim Fergus is field editor and monthly columnist for sports Afield magazine and also writes a monthly feature on the AllOutdoors.com Web site. His work has appeared in numerous national magazines and newspapers, and he is the author of the nonfiction book A Hunter's Road. He lives in northern Colorado.